"A policy where our objective would be to cause [China] to be poor would be a grave error for the United States…"
So would a policy that did not try to prevent Chinese GDP to surpass US GDP and the main policy instruments we have for that at the national level is low deficits, high immigration, especially highly skilled/educatable immigration, and support for globalization. Yimby-ism and congestion/road use charges is another but not a national policy instrument (although there may be tweaks to environmental legislation to prevent it from being used to prevent development and infrastructure.) investment).
"It will only produce prices that serve as guides to direct and coordinate the human division of labor."
And with additional complexity of development more activities will be found to produce positive and negative externalities, so an unregulated market will not be able even to properly coordinate the division of labor. CO2 accumulation and systemic financial risk cannot be priced by market participants.
"A policy where our objective would be to cause [China] to be poor would be a grave error for the United States…"
So would a policy that did not try to prevent Chinese GDP to surpass US GDP and the main policy instruments we have for that at the national level is low deficits, high immigration, especially highly skilled/educatable immigration, and support for globalization. Yimby-ism and congestion/road use charges is another but not a national policy instrument (although there may be tweaks to environmental legislation to prevent it from being used to prevent development and infrastructure.) investment).
"It will only produce prices that serve as guides to direct and coordinate the human division of labor."
And with additional complexity of development more activities will be found to produce positive and negative externalities, so an unregulated market will not be able even to properly coordinate the division of labor. CO2 accumulation and systemic financial risk cannot be priced by market participants.